11of12Head coach Gretchen Rush (center) serves a calzone to members of the Trinity women’s tennis team during a party at her home.Photo: Edward A. Ornelas / Edward A. Ornelas / San Antonio Express-News

Rush, 50, doesn’t know if she’ll produce any NCAA champions while coaching her alma mater, but she is certain of this: She will do everything she can to ensure her players don’t fall victim to eating disorders, a scourge of young female athletes that includes anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating.

“I know what the warning signs are,” Rush said. “I’ve been around it enough to know.”

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Gretchen Rush

Position: Trinity women’s tennis coach

Hometown: Pittsburgh

Age: 50

Fast facts

Four-time All-America at Trinity from 1983-86.

Inducted into Trinity Athletics Hall of Fame in 2001.

Won four singles and four double titles as a professional.

Overheard

Rush, on her professional tennis career: “It’s hard to have the whole package. Not everybody is Julia Roberts — articulate, brilliant and beautiful. I was just missing a few elements I needed. I didn’t have the self-confidence of a Martina Navratilova, the mental fortitude of a Chris Evert or the focus of a Steffi Graf. . . . But I’m grateful I got as far as I did. I have no regrets.”

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A four-time All-American for Trinity from 1983-86 when the school was a Division I tennis power, Rush returned to the hilltop campus in April. She arrived with sensitivity to women with body issues after watching several friends and competitors struggle with eating disorders.

Houston’s Zina Garrison, who helped defeat Rush in the 1988 mixed doubles final at Wimbledon, battled bulimia as a pro.

Jennifer Amdur, who Rush faced in junior tennis, killed herself with her father’s shotgun at age 18 in 1982 after being ravaged by anorexia nervosa, which leaves its victims so obsessed with weight that some starve themselves to death.

And then there was MacGregor. “Cinny” was at San Diego State the same time Rush was at Trinity and later was a fellow pro. They teamed to win a USTA junior doubles event in 1982.

“She was really healthy and strong then,” Rush said. “ . . . It wasn’t a complete shock when she died, but obviously it was disappointing and sad to have a friend die, especially one in her early 30s.”

In 2008, the National Athletic Trainers Association estimated 35 percent of female athletes were at risk for anorexia nervosa and 38 percent were at risk for bulimia nervosa. Other studies show at least one-third of female athletes have disordered eating patterns, including constant dieting, purging through vomiting and abusing laxatives and diet pills.

“Women in our culture receive a lot of mixed messages,” Rush said. “We want to be strong, competitive, but we also want to be thin, beautiful and look like Maria Sharapova. But not everyone is built like that.”

With that in mind, Rush has no eating restrictions on her athletes.

“I don’t weigh them,” she said. “I feed them cookies. I don’t want to be a factor in adding to anyone having a problem. I want them to have a healthy relationship with food, to enjoy it and be grateful for it. (Body image issues) are so prevalent in our culture. I have two daughters, and, thankfully, they have healthy appetites and love to eat.”

While coaching at California’s Claremont-Mudd-Scripps — like Trinity an NCAA Division III school — the past two years, Rush encouraged her team to attend a campus lecture given by the mother of a young woman who died from anorexia nervosa.

“Her daughter was a normal, healthy (college-age) child and then she was dead like 10 months later,” Rush said. “She had gotten into a mindset of, 'I’ve got to be (thin), I’ve got to be (thin),’ and then she got really sick.”

During her decade-long career on the WTA circuit, which included reaching the quarterfinals of the French Open, Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, Rush had her own body-image struggle.

“I wanted to look like Chris Evert,” said Rush, who retired in 1992 with four singles and four doubles championships and the distinction of ranking as high as No. 13 in the world during a golden era for the sport.

Although she never had an eating disorder, Rush admits to making some poor decisions.

“There was a period where I wanted to be really good at tennis and I probably trained too hard and didn’t eat enough, but it lasted only a couple of months,” she said.

A native of Pittsburgh, Rush turned down scholarship offers to Stanford and UCLA. She chose Trinity because it was the “right fit,” while the other schools felt out of her comfort zone.

In addition to recording a singles record of 117-12 (.906), she teamed with Louise Allen to win the 1983 NCAA doubles championship and was doubles runner-up in 1985 with Lisa Sassano — now Lisa Westergard, Rush’s assistant coach — and in 1986 with Ann Hulbert.

Rush was also the NCAA singles runner-up in 1985 and 1986, winning the College Women’s Player of the Year Award in 1984 and 1985. But her favorite memories of her college days are team-oriented.

The Rush-led Tigers’ best moment came in the 1985 NCAA Division I quarterfinals, when they upset defending national champion Stanford en route to a third-place finish.

Wins over Texas also resonate, but Trinity’s days of competing against Division I behemoths ended in 1990. That’s when it dropped to D-III, which does not offer athletic scholarships.

Like many of the school’s other coaches, Rush has no desire to be at a higher level.

“I’m a bit cynical about (big-time) football and basketball and the huge amounts of money coming down on each game,” Rush said. “It’s a little tainted: Are they true student athletes? But Division III is wonderful. The athletes play for the love of the game.”

That belief dovetails with her overarching philosophy.

“If we aren’t having fun, we’re doing something wrong,” she said. “We’re playing to win, and winning is fun. But there’s a lot of interesting parts to tennis that can be really delightful and joyful. I learned early you try your heart out then you go out and have fun. You enjoy your family, friends, go sightseeing, do other things.”

It’s all part of what she calls the “Division III balance.”

“The girls are in sororities, going to parties, involved in service,” Rush said. “They’re doing a lot of stuff. Nobody is making them (play tennis). It’s not their job. It’s their playtime, their joy. It’s trying to be a well-balanced human being.”

The players appreciate Rush’s holistic approach. One cited her giving private lessons to a teammate whose class schedule prevents her from attending practice as an example of the coach’s flexibility.

“She’s easy to work with, very relaxed,” said freshman Marie Lutz, an Alamo Heights graduate. “We came here to have fun and play tennis, but we’re also students. She understands that.”

Liza Southwick, a sophomore from Nashville, Tennessee, agreed.

“She’s really concerned about us doing well, doing our best,” Southwick said. “But she’s not obsessed with winning to where it’s not enjoyable for us.”

The players also applaud Rush’s efforts to curb eating disorders.

“That’s one of the most important things she does,” Southwick said. “We actually have a body image program (that) athletes have to go through, but having a coach reinforce it is really important. She’s not so much worried about your weight or what you eat as she is with you feeling good and being confident.”

Experts applaud Rush’s approach.

“What she is doing is terrific,” said Dr. Kathryn E. Ackerman of the Female Athlete Program at Boston Children’s Hospital. “A coach is often like a parental figure for the athletes. They see them frequently and highly influence them. So when you have a person like that giving the kind of positive message she’s giving, it’s great.”

Although tennis isn’t an aesthetic sport such as figure skating or gymnastics, where thinness is considered a competitive advantage, body image issues still abound, Ackerman said.

“With sports like tennis and beach volleyball, where clothing can be fairly revealing, there can be extra pressure to try to look good,” Ackerman said.

Above all else, Rush wants her players to love themselves as they are.

“It’s a big deal growing up,” Rush said. “It’s not easy. I want to create an environment where they’re having a good time, enjoying their sport, and just let them be themselves.”

After three years as a part-time employee covering mainly high school sports, Tom Orsborn became a full-time employee at the Express-News in October 1985. He's covered the Dallas Cowboys and the NFL since 1999 and has also covered the Spurs, the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, and a variety of other events, including 14 Super Bowls.